Search

Social media

Become a Fan

Where the Deer and Antelope Play

August 12, 2015

I know, it's been, what, two months since I wrote about how much I hate living here, with longing references to how much I loved living in England even though I complained about the plumbing and the weather all the time when I did.

If you can't parse that sentence, sorry. I'll try to write better from now on.

To sum up the promise in that title, here are the latest reasons I've found for wishing I lived somewhere else, namely, somewhere near the 51st parallel, just a tad shy of the first longitude line.

Eleventy One: The heat.

Eleventy Two: The humidity.

Eleventy Three: The bugs.

It's not the heat, it's the humidity, but sometimes it's both, and the bugs that seem to be attracted to both. And not just the mosquitoes, but the noisy cicadas and crickets and other biting things that can infest a house if you have a dog and are not careful. (I found a tick on my neck one day. I can't even type that without grossing out.)

The cicadas, or maybe it's crickets, make a racket like the sound of 200 televisions tuned into 200 different chat shows. I don't know how the creatures can hear well enough to figure out which cicada to mate with, with all that awful noise going on. It reminds me of something I've struggled to forget...oh, I remember! It's my childhood.

And I know some smart people will have realized that I have air conditioning on this side of the Atlantic, which should make short work of that heat and humidity (that's why they're called "de-humidifiers", duh!) but they don't work as well as advertised, especially when they're approximately 50 years old. (We even have two, one for upstairs and one for downstairs and basement, and yes, we've added freon.) Ceiling fans, however, do a remarkable job of cooling the air to a livable level.

It's so bad that I find myself longing for Autumn, my least favorite season. That's when all the pretty stuff dies, including leaves, which we have a lot of around here.

I'll miss them, but if they take those noisy cicadas and the wretched heat with them, I'll be happy to rake them up in a few weeks. And by then I'll probably have a few more reasons to hate living here on the 38th parallel.

January 12, 2015

No, that's not a photo from the 1960s. It's from 2014, made after the leaves have fallen from the trees, which highlights the subject of the photo, and of this blog post: the overhead powerlines.

As I document the differences I find here from life in southern England, the barren trees have exposed another oddity that didn't seem so stark when I first moved here in late August. Overhead powerlines run from house to house, alongside neighborhood streets in a suburb not that far from the nation's capital. Yet you'd think you were in the Indian subcontinent, where power lines, for those lucky enough to have electricity, are all exposed.

Or maybe in the outer edges of Scotland.

I don't recall seeing overhead powerlines in the leafy suburbs surrounding London. That's because most powerlines are buried. As a result, we rarely lost electricity. In fact, the only time I remember it happening was when workmen were digging in the street above our cul-de-sac. I wrote about it here; it was quite the cultural experience.

There are many reasons why most powerlines in the US are not buried. The cost of burying powerlines over the larger populated geographical areas here is estimated to be in the billions (not just a few billion, either: $41 billion, according to the latest estimate). Power companies don't want to pay for it, despite the costs involved of restoring electricity to their customers when the lines inevitably come down during the frequent storms that hit the American continent. Nor do their customers want higher electricity bills, and are willing, one would assume, to put up with not-so-infrequent power outages.

It's led to those with means installing generators. Our house has a whole-house natural gas generator which I expect we'll use one day. There are lots of trees in this neighborhood, tall trees with limbs just waiting to fall on unsuspecting power lines. And there are multitudes of squirrels who also can damage power lines.

Those retro powerlines represent not just the frugal nature of Americans, and their governments' (both state, local, and federal) unwillingness to impose taxes for the common good, they also represent just how vast and unweildy our suburbs have become. They're strung together with flimsy power cords and poles certain to come down as soon as the next hurricane season gets underway, or the next category four tornado rolls in from the Plains.

Forty-one billion doesn't sound that bad, when you're freezing in an unheated home and watching your frozen food melt. Personally, I'd prefer a more streamlined aesthetic to my neighborhood, even if—especially if—it prevents the squirrels from using powerlines as a method of transport.

October 29, 2014

I opened another box to unpack today, ready to put away or throw away what was inside (I've decided to get rid of unnecessary clutter while I unpack) and I realized I'd just opened a Pandora's box. It was my maps, maps of London, the UK, Europe, and, most poignant of all, my hiking maps of the Chilterns. As I picked up each one, smoothed it back and sorted it into a pile, I grew sad and mopey, thinking of all the routes I'd not be taking again.

I never used an app or a sat nav; when I arrived in England in 2004 neither was available. I clung to my old fashioned maps, of which I had plenty—some are actually historical maps I acquired, fascinated by how little the English geography had changed in the last 400 years.

After I'd pulled out half the box, I couldn't go any further. It didn't help that it's a rare gray and drizzly day here in Virginia, similar to so many gray days I spent in England. I didn't want to think of the return trip to the Yorkshire Dales I never made, the maps of Florence and Copenhagen I wouldn't need, of Bath and Windsor, of Reading and the Thames Path.

I also found a map of Metro DC and Frederick, Maryland, that some kind soul gave us in preparation for our move. I left them in the box.

One day I'll get out and explore this New World, but not right now, when I've got boxes waiting to be unpacked and a cup of tea to finish off this drizzly day.

October 09, 2014

Those Romans clearly knew what they were on about, with not one but five roundabouts on the way to Cirencester.

I love to drive. In England, I always volunteered to do the driving if anyone was organizing an outing, especially if newcomers were coming along. Most Americans have difficulty driving in the UK when they first arrive, but that's mainly to do with knowing one's way around. The driving part—well, that's easy, I found.

Most Americans assume the hard part of driving in the UK is just staying on the left side of the road. But I quickly adjusted to that. Roundabouts are also assumed to be a problem, but once I figured out that the car inside the roundabout has the right of way, those were easy peasy too. In fact, I soon came to love roundabouts—I enjoyed gliding through them, after a tap on the brakes to slow down, a glance to the right, and then a smooth acceleration into the circle. Signs clearly marked which spoke to get off on, and the lanes were marked with arrows so you knew the proper lane to be in for your exit.

And luckily, I have a good sense of direction, so the winding network of ancient roads in Britain weren't much of a challenge; in fact, I quite enjoyed tooling around, figuring out which village lay in the direction I wanted to go, finding quaint out-of-the-way spots I'd never have found by using a sat nav.

I could go on, but writing about driving in England just makes me sad, now that I'm living in a major metropolitan area in America. The roads here are monstrously wide—some have six lanes, with turn lanes on either side, which, theoretically, should get you where you want to go faster, right? Wrong. At every intersection, including multiple entrances to shopping centers, there's a traffic light. And at each traffic light there are signals to turn, both directions, which mean the red lights last hours.

I can't figure out what people do to amuse themselves while they're waiting at the interminable red lights. I've seen some drivers fiddling with their phones. I've thought about bringing a book to read. Some ingenious marketer ought to provide traffic light entertainment. Maybe a giant screen set up over the lanes, showing YouTube videos or short news clips for the waiting drivers. I'd love to catch up on the latest breaking news while I'm gathering my thoughts at yet another red light.

There are also superhighways here, limited access interstates with names all ending in 95. Some of them have HOV lanes; others have HOT lanes, and I know if I try to drive in them I'll be arrested and summarily shot. So I avoid the interstates altogether, thinking longingly of the friendly M25 as I prepare to brake at yet another red light.

It's nerve wracking, knowing that at any moment a light will turn amber, then red, as I cruise down the road. What if I'm going too fast to stop? What if I'm glancing at the radio dial and I miss it altogether? What if I'm in the wrong lane to turn, or worse, am in the left lane and suddenly everyone in it wants to turn and the traffic whizzing by on the right won't let me get over? And then I have to sit through, yes, another damned red light. And here I am without a book to read.

Another puzzling thing: though I've found people here are amazingly friendly when they're not in their cars—even when they're in close proximity to their cars in the parking lot—once they get in their cars, they can't wait to express their rage. I've been honked at repeatedly, and there's never any of the friendly gestures, the winking tail lights thanking me for letting someone cut in, that I became used to in Britain, where people will cross the street to avoid talking to you in person, but they'll always let you cut into traffic.

I've decided driving is the thing I dislike most about America. If someone could start from scratch, tear up all the roads and begin again, as if they're Roman engineers two thousand years ago, I'm certain the sharp intersections would be replaced by gentle roundabouts. The superwide streets would be supplemented with sidewalks and crosswalks—even a zebra or two would be welcome. And flower salesmen at the stop lights, offering fresh bouquets for a tenner, would go a long way in making our commutes more awesome.

I suspect people would be less cross here in America if they didn't have to worry about stopping for red lights so often, if the wide concrete expanses were less like an airport runway and more like a country lane. And let's replace those HOV lanes with single-track roads, shall we? That'll put a stop to fuel-hogging Americans driving their behemoths to work instead of using public transportation, like sensible people.

September 04, 2014

It's not yet been a week since we repatriated to these shores, not too far from the same Potomac River George Washington's ancestor sailed up after crossing the Atlantic the slow way. We came across much faster, on a United jet, the last one to leave on Friday afternoon.

We chose United for their PetSafe program, which allows dogs to travel as checked baggage (with certain restrictions) and is especially geared for military and state department families who are relocating. The pet area of the baggage compartment is pressurized and temperature controlled and has enough room for five pets (but Sparky was by himself on the flight, which he prefers--more legroom).

We weren't sure what to expect when we arrived at Terminal 2 for the flight. All we knew is that we had to be there 3 hours early, with the required paperwork. The whole event turned out to be quite well managed and not at all stressful. We filled out the paperwork and paid for Sparky's travel, then were able to keep him with us until about an hour before the flight, when we went with him through a special security where his kennel was swabbed. Then we said goodbye to him, trying to be cheerful, and went through our own security and then to our gate.

(My last walk on British soil, I realize now, was the grassy area near Terminal 2, where we let Sparky relieve himself before the eight hour flight. I was too nervous to take note, frankly, of the fact I was leaving England for good, after ten years. If I had, I'd have watered the lawn with my tears.)

Once on board, we told Elle, the nice flight attendant, that we were traveling with our dog. She could tell right away how nervous we were, because she offered us Valium. Just kidding, she sold us a bottle (and then another) of red wine.

She also let the captain know that our dog would be on board (pets are loaded last). He talked to the baggage handlers who loaded Sparky onto the plane and reported back to us that all was well.

We were pretty stressed after the week of packing, dealing with the house, and taking care of last minute details in England. I tried to watch a film but I was too nervous. Elle said that sometimes they hear dogs barking in the rear of the plane, so I asked her to let us know if she heard anything. When the flight was over, she told us she'd not heard anything. Still, I couldn't rest until I saw them wheeling his kennel out in the baggage claim, while I was waiting in line at Immigration. The border agent stamped my documents quickly and I raced toward Sparky. He didn't start whining until he saw us, but the attendant who was wheeling him around wouldn't let us open the cage door.

Once we were near the arrivals entrance at Dulles, we let Sparky out and raced to find some grass outside, for his first pee on American soil.

This is Sparky's second "immigration"--he first came to England from Ireland, and now is an American dog, an American dog with a funny accent. He doesn't like the sweltering heat, or the thunderstorms that break overhead almost every evening, but he loves the abundance of squirrels and the woods near our house.

This land near the Potomac seems young to me, with wide open spaces (mostly in the medians of the highways, which are wide enough to build a housing estate) and garish churches made of brick, rather than aged stone. There are ditches rather than hedgerows and strip malls instead of high streets, and people here are downright eager to talk to strangers.

June 21, 2014

If you've read my book, you'll know I prefer roundabouts to the stop signs and traffic signals that clog up American roads. Now there's scientific proof that roundabouts are superior.

Don't believe me? Believe Mythbusters. Watch the segment of Mythbusters above, if you can. Spoiler: Roundabouts are better. There, you don't have to listen to the whole silly and rather condescending narrative. More cars go through the intersection via roundabout than by four way stop: 385 drivers via four-way stop vs. 460 in the roundabouts. (Maybe the word "stop" in the name should be a clue.)

Next, we'll prove that British television is better than American telly. I sat through an American archaeology program the other day, an "is-this-an-ancient-monument-or-not" show, and I couldn't believe how much better Time Team would have handled the question. It's as if they think their viewing audience are idiots, and I know that despite a few prominent examples, that's not the case.

June 05, 2014

No, the plumbing issues still aren't solved, though I'm happy to report I have a new toilet (a crappy toilet with a flimsy plastic seat) and a new water softener.

But the shower, leaking since February, in case you've just joined us, is still in bits and pieces. The tile was removed, along with the cracked shower tray, and now the tiles are cracked and can't go back in, which was a problem anyway since the new tray is shallower and needed another strip of tile. Since the house was built in the early nineties, finding matching tile is impossible; the best they can hope for is to blend in with the rest. And with the entire bathroom covered in the rust-colored tile, it's turning out to be a big project.

We've resigned ourselves to never using that bathroom again. We've moved most of our stuff into the guest bathroom, and only go in there to brush our teeth, and to marvel at the mess that is British Plumbing.

The room smells like a sewer too, so I really am just as happy to never go in there again.

And there are rumors wafting from across the pond that we may be moving this summer, which, frankly, can't happen too soon. (Although I'm not putting too much stock in them, since those rumors have been squelched before.)

Have you read my book yet? In it I offer some insight into my frame of mind when these maybe-moves occur. The plumbing problems are all part of an effort by the gods to convince me I no longer want to live here, and just when I'm convinced, bam! They pull the rug out from under me and I suddenly find myself facing another few years with British plumbing.

So when I find myself longing for a proper sink, a single handle faucet, and a bathroom that doesn't smell, I remind myself of all the lovely bits of Britain I'd miss. In other words, I just lie back and think of England.

It's just as well I've not had to entertain the repairmen for the last few days. On Sunday I hosted a garden party for a friend who's moving back to the States (where he will no doubt enjoy proper plumbing) and then I faced a deadline—for my next book, coming out (hopefully) in the Autumn.

Oh, and did I mention that the kitchen sink started leaking? I opened the cabinet underneath on Sunday and discovered water pooling inside. We put a bucket underneath the pipes, offered a prayer to the Plumbing Gods, and tightened up a connection. Sorted.

And so I soldier on with a stiff upper lip, holding my nose against the sewer gas.

February 03, 2014

So apparently a Super Bowl ad angered a bunch of folks. Maybe watching grown men pummel each other brings out the worst in people. And with the half-time entertainment keeping their body parts covered, what else is there to do but beat up on multinational corporation Coca Cola?

Here's the ad that's got some people up in arms:

The ad starts out singing "America the Beautiful" in English, then switches to other voices singing about how drop dead gorgeous America is in languages other than English. It's really sweet, but some people think it's a "a truly disturbing commercial."

Maybe they're unaware that "America the Beautiful" isn't the official national anthem—that would be "The Star Spangled Banner," the song no one likes to sing because they can't hit that impossibly high note. Or maybe they're confusing it with "My Country, 'Tis of Thee"—oh wait, the words to that one are actually "God save our gracious queen, long live our noble queen." I don't suppose any Super Bowl fans would even know the words to that song.

Or maybe they don't like people from other countries admiring America's shining seas. That's going to really suck for America's tourism business, but whatever. Just keep on hatin' on America, if you speak a language other than English. We won't know anyway.

To add insult to perceived injury, the ad was played during the Super Bowl, the crown jewel of American football...how dare they try to encourage other nationalities to enjoy such an all-American spectacle! Except the NFL has been so desperate to export American-style football to other countries that they keep filling Wembley Stadium with heavily padded "football" players—the latest exhibition game featured the Vikings and the Steelers, and now there are blokes from Watford wearing Viking braids to cheer on Tottenham.

I don't expect Coke's bottom line to be harmed by the boycott. These days Coke sells more Coke to non-Americans, plus I suspect those idiots threatening to boycott drink more Keystone Light than Coke. Besides, just look at all the exposure Janet Jackson got when she was the one facing Fox News' wrath for her, err, exposure.

And you wonder why some Americans in Europe go around faking Canadian accents. When a few yokels get hot and bothered about children singing about the fruited plains of America in Spanish, I'm tempted to whip out my Canadian accent too.

What's the Canadian national anthem, anyway? And does it have any high notes?

April 24, 2013

It is somewhat ironic that, the week that a weak gun control measure failed to exceed the votes in the Senate needed to overcome a filibuster, the Tsarnaev brothers used two bombs, rather than guns, to kill three people at the Boston Marathon.

This is surely a moral victory for gun rights advocates, right? Bombs kill people too! Why ban guns (or in this case, require background checks at gun shows) when a criminally-minded individual can simply kill victims with another weapon, like a knife or a bomb.

But instead of supporting gun rights advocates' arguments, the story of the Boston bombers illustrates perfectly why we should keep guns out of the hands of people who would use them to harm innocent people.

Because those bombs those would-be terrorists cooked up killed three people. Only three people! As awful as it is for three people to have lost their lives, those three innocent victims would have been joined by countless others at the morgue if the brothers had each carried a Bushmaster instead of a pressure cooker bomb. Each one could have mowed down dozens at the crowded finish line. The scores gravely wounded by the blasts would have turned into hundreds with bullets designed to expand upon impact, unlike the nails and BBs that packed the bombs.

It appears the brothers used pyrotechnics to fuel their homemade bombs:

Tamerlan Tsarnaev bought two “good-size” mortar kits, consisting of tubes and shells, and black powder, said William Weimer, vice president of the store, Phantom. He said Tsarnaev paid $199.99 under a buy-one-get-one-free deal.

I had no idea this sort of thing was legal to buy, and frankly, I see no reason why it should be legal. Yet, mortar kits presumably have a use beyond killing people—which is why we don't ban cars, which are responsible for killing tens of thousands of people every year. Still, I suspect quite a few people will be clamoring for certain fireworks to be made illegal, or require, say, a background check before they can be purchased. And I'd be willing to bet some of the same people who called their senator and told him to vote "no" on background checks will be the ones clamoring for regulation of black powder.

See? I told you this was ironic.

The brothers did kill one man with a gun, which they'd obtained illegally. They used it to attack a police officer, apparently in hopes of taking his gun from him. Yet that gun was locked in a holster. A good lock kept this gun out of the hands of those who wanted to do harm. A good lock would have kept that Bushmaster out of Adam Lanza's hands, too, yet there are no laws in the US requiring guns to be locked when not in use.

It's not so easy to obtain guns in Massachusetts as it is in other states—the Commonwealth has some of the toughest gun laws in the United States. Perhaps if the brothers had lived in Texas they'd have bought Bushmasters and shot dozens dead at a Cowboys game.

It's easy to imagine a scenario where many, many more could be killed at a large event, using perfectly legal weapons of mass destruction. Adam Lanza killed 26 people in five minutes. Imagine if there'd been two Adam Lanzas, and those two had decided to keep on killing rather than turn the gun on themselves... Imagine if the Columbine killers had kept on killing, rather than aimlessly wandering the halls and finally killing themselves. Ironically, a suicide bomber will almost always up the number of casualties when he's willing to die, yet killers with a gun lower the damage they inflict by those same suicidal instincts.

Around 85 people die every day in the United States due to gun violence. That's 28 Bostons. Every day.

Yet nothing at all is being done about it. No increased background checks, no magazine limits, no assault rifle bans. I guess those 85 people don't matter, because they weren't killed by a "proper" weapon of mass destruction.

It's hard to imagine a terrorist bombing 85 people every day in America and getting away with it, isn't it?

February 02, 2013

When police on a weapons raid swarmed a housing project after London’s 2011 riots, they seized a cache of arms that in the United States might be better suited to “Antiques Roadshow” than inner city ganglands. Inside plastic bags hidden in a trash collection room, officers uncovered two archaic flintlock pistols, retrofitted flare guns and a Jesse James-style revolver.

These days, that kind of antiquated firepower is about the baddest a British gang member can get. Spurred to action by a series of mass shootings — including one startlingly similar to the Sandy Hook school tragedy in Connecticut — Britain entered an era of national soul searching in which legislative bans on assault weapons and handguns were pushed through and background checks for other types of firearms dramatically tightened.

It's interesting that it's the Washington Post, not the Guardian, that breaks down the facts about gun ownership in Britain. I suspect that the British public just isn't that interested in hearing about their gun laws. They work, and that's that.

This week I learned about "time-share" guns, weapons owned by criminals that are borrowed or rented, then flashed around to show other gangsters that someone is capable of acquiring a gun. That's what happened in the Mark Duggan case, whose shooting by police sparked the London riots in 2011.

The number of weapons that were removed since the 1997 school shooting in Scotland that spurred strict gun laws are astounding:

In the U.K., a nation of 62 million people, more than 200,000 guns and 700 tons of ammunition have been taken off the streets during the past 15 years, with offenders in search of firearms now resorting to rebuilt antique weapons, homemade bullets and even illicit “rent-a-gun” schemes. Legal guns — including some types of rifles and shotguns largely suitable for farms and sport — must be kept in locked boxes bolted to floors or walls and are subject to random police inspection and vigorous inquires about the mental health and family life of owners.

Would a scheme like this work in the US? I'd like to think so. However, I can't help but notice this:

Police officers in England and Wales, for instance, now routinely contact the physicians of new applicants to inquire whether they are being treated for mental illnesses including depression.

I'd like to see gun laws in America that include this crucial step. However, until Obamacare kicks in, (and even after, for millions who'll fall through the cracks) many Americans don't have a family doctor. They'll have had access, if at all, to a patchwork of medical providers, including emergency room physicians who aren't equipped to treat mental illness. We (still) need a more comprehensive health care system in America before widespread mental health checks can be as effective as they are in Britain.

Despite the quote at the end of this piece by a so-called gun rights advocate, there is no clamor from the public who long to have guns. I've never heard anyone, in person, or in the media, state that gun control has gone too far here.

The British public like the tradeoff they made: far fewer guns in circulation equal far fewer deaths. Those who have a genuine need or desire can still access them, but they're kept safely locked and out of the hands of the mentally ill and criminals.

Here's another astounding statistic:

Today, law enforcement officials say ballistic tests indicate that most gun crime in Britain can be traced back to less than 1,000 illegal weapons still in circulation.

A thousand guns. And 59 deaths last year. That's fewer people than are killed every day in America by guns.

February 09, 2012

Forget drones. President Obama has a more effective weapon in his arsenal.

The Marshmallow Cannon, created by science fair contestant Joey Hudy, should take out the odd al-Qaeda holdout still sauntering around Sudan. Elements of the Taliban still fashioning old-school IEDs in Afghanistan will flee to the bargaining table once they get a load of the awesomeness created by 14-year old American inventors.

Yeah, just wait till POTUS unloads a few Jet Puffs on their ass. OUR ENEMIES WILL DEFLATE LIKE CAKE.

December 01, 2011

I just returned from a visit to the US, where the lack of media coverage of the eurozone crisis suprised me. I'm not sure if it was the holidays, with all the tryptophan-induced comas, or the Black Friday madness, but no one in the US is talking about what's sure to be the biggest blow to the global economy since Lehman Brothers collapsed.

While here in the UK the euro crisis is all anyone is talking about (well, anyone on Radio 4), there's hardly any awareness of the coming disaster in the US.

On the other hand, they have their own madness to worry about. Sure, the US economy is showing signs of improvement, with unemployment creeping down and GDP inching up, and Black Friday (so-called because the day after Thanksgiving is when retail stores traditionally go "into the black" on their balance sheets) producing record sales (up 9% over last year). Yet Black Friday was also accompanied by evidence Americans have gone mad: one customer at Wal-Mart pulled out a can of pepper spray and doused fellow shoppers in order to make off with bargain X-boxes.

Meanwhile, other superstores found themselves awash in yellow crime tape rather than red Christmas bows after Black Friday shootings occurred in their parking lots.

Considering American broadcast media isn't keen to produce quality, informative news programs even during the best of times, it's no surprise the mere mention of "pepper spray" and "Wal-Mart" managed to knock out any mention of the approaching Euro-Armageddon. Not even Nancy Grace wavered from her fixation on Natalie Wood to mention what is surely a bigger crime, as political leaders in Europe continue to refuse to fix the mess they made.

So America sleeps in its turkey-fueled haze, while the disgruntled pack armaments in their handbags as they hunt for loss-leadered merchandise. I tried to warn a few ancient relatives about what was coming, as the euro crisis nears a final denouement, but all I got were yawns.

America does not feel your pain, Europe. But you'll feel theirs—if you get anywhere near that X-box.

November 21, 2011

I'm off to the US tomorrow, and I'm trying to prepare myself for the culture shock. Most people can't understand why I find things other Americans take for granted‚ like driving on the right side of the road, so odd. But after seven years abroad, I feel more like an alien in my home country than a natural born citizen.

It's not so much the speech, though I'm shocked when Southerners take four syllables to pronounce a word like "drops". I still speak American English like a native, albeit one who has an odd way with "water" and "butter".

Rather, it's the day-to-day getting around that I find alternately baffling, frustrating, or simply amazing.

Those amber waves of grain have been mowed and turned into huge parking lots—some of which are meant to be roads. But they no longer function as such, due to the many impediments placed in the way of the driver.

Take traffic lights, a ubiquitous feature of US roadways. God shed his grace on America along with thousands of miles of concrete, and then crowned it all with multicolored traffic lights—which don't have the good sense to turn yellow before going green the way they do in the UK.

The few traffic lights in Britain are mostly for pedestrian crossings rather than intersections. My small town just added two new pedestrian crossings when the new Tesco opened, which drivers found a huge impediment and pedestrians, who were used to dashing across the high street, found equally annoying.

Which is to another odd thing: shopping in the UK is mostly done on the "high street" which is sort of like Main Street in the US, only it's not a concept, it's an actual street. It may not be named "High Street", although often it is, but it's the main road in a town where most commerce takes place. (Our high street is actually named Packhorse, a common street name here. Other roads are named for where they go, which means London Rd and Oxford Rd are, naturally, the same road.)

Shopping in the US, on the other hand, most often takes place at or near a mall. Surrounding a mall are dozens of large and small stores, connected by a system of super-sized carparks requiring an advanced global positioning system just to navigate. It reminds me of a giant pinball machine, with your oversized car the pinball, searching desperately to find its way out of the maze. Or at least to the empty parking space nearest to Target's red front doors.

And Target—is there any place more beloved than Target? Even Michelle Obama was recently spotted pushing a red shopping cart (with its wheels spinning in only one direction, mind you!) through the wide, spotless aisles of TargGHAY, as Americans ironically refer to the upscale discount superstore. How many times have I walked into Target, intending to buy one thing, and I come out $200 later with a shopping cart full of cheap t-shirts and polka dot serving bowls and a rug to match?

It's like every high street shop, combined into one giant red bullseye. With free parking!

I am convinced the main reason I hate to shop in the UK is the lack of convenient parking. I willingly walk miles every day for pleasure, but when I'm shopping I can't bear the idea of parking a quarter mile from the shops and dragging purchases back to my cramped car in its too small parking space. Opening the car door without hitting another car is like performing delicate surgery in a toilet. (Which of course is never said in America, unless you sell plumbing fixtures. Americans go to the "bathroom" or the "restroom" though many women go to the "little girls' room".)

Most amazing of all, though, is that at most large American stores you can shop 24/7! (A term Americans invented to describe the proper functioning of commerce.) That includes Sunday, since blue laws, in the spirit of unbridled consumerism, were abolished ages ago. Even chain bookstores like Barnes and Noble are open until eleven p.m. But I like to go early, when I'm wide awake at 5 a.m. Those aisles at the superstores are even wider then, and I can wheel my ungainly shopping cart unhindered through corridors freshly stocked with a fabulous array of items. I find things I never knew I needed, and almost never regret purchasing. Like socks. Polka dot socks, to match the throw rug and the serving bowl.

And when I pay for my purchases, I can slide my non-chip and pin debit card through a little machine myself, punch the proper buttons, and never hand it over to anyone else! Likewise, it's easy to get more cash: drive-through ATMs are everywhere. It's like scoring extra points by hitting the right bumper in the pinball game, except you score some extra cash when you drive through an ATM.

Americans are experts at driving through things. There are even drive thru gas stations. In America, you can fill up your huge tank without having to go inside the service station—you just slide a credit card through the slot on the pump and when you're done, you can race off. At least until you hit the first red light.

Roads are generally wide enough to serve as emergency landing for distressed jumbo jets, yet all that concrete is deceptive: Many lanes are for turning only, which means you have to sit through—you guessed it—more red lights. By the time it's your turn to go, you've forgotten why you wanted to turn in the first place.

Maybe it was for fast food: there are approximately 160,000 fast food restaurants in the US, where of course the term "fast food" means you drive through a dedicated lane where you interact with three different fast food workers and 30 minutes later you finally receive your order at the last window.

Yet supermarkets, surprisingly, don't sell the variety of ready meals that they do in the UK. But they make up for it by the wide variety of food available right at the till. By the time you've finished shopping in a Super Sized Wal-Mart you're so famished you reach for one of the candy bars conveniently located by the check out. Some Raisinets ought to make the drive home easier—surely this is what they mean by fruited plain!

Oh, America, you are indeed beautiful, despite your quirks. If only you'd embraced roundabouts the way you embraced the drive thru. Then I could get to Target much faster.

September 13, 2011

I can see why so many people were turned off by the over-the-top "celebrations" surrounding the ten year anniversary of September 11. The American media can turn any event into an unseemly circus (see "Wedding, Royal", and "Diana, Princess") in an effort to chase ratings.

But the date seems to have turned into something much more sinister in the United States. At The Atlantic James Fallows writes about a series of false alarm arrests on Sunday. People spent too long in the bathroom, and were deemed suspicious in more than once instance. But by far the most alarming is the young woman who, along with two other passengers, was arrested simply because, well, she was dark skinned—the woman is Arab/Jewish and the men, unknown to her and to each other, were Indian.

Her account of what happened—including the tweets she initially sent, before she was separated from her phone and spreadeagled against a car—is appalling. It begins:

Silly me. I thought flying on 9/11 would be easy. I figured most people would choose not to fly that day so lines would be short, planes would be lightly filled and though security might be ratcheted up, we’d all feel safer knowing we had come a long way since that dreadful Tuesday morning 10 years ago.

This shouldn't happen in America. This shouldn't happen in a free country. This shouldn't happen, ever, because fear of terrorists has made us react in terror, and with terroristic methods, toward perfectly innocent people who did absolutely nothing wrong.

When the young woman, Shoshana Hebshi, was released, the FBI agent told her,

“It’s 9/11 and people are seeing ghosts. They are seeing things that aren’t there.” He said they had to act on a report of suspicious behavior, and this is what the reaction looks like.

He said there had been 50 other similar incidents across the country that day.

Someone on that plane thought he was doing the right thing. He probably imagined himself a hero, stopping three suspicious people from inflicting harm on his fellow Americans.

He was not a hero. He was an idiot. And there were plenty just like him on 9/11—at least 50 idiots flying that day, who thought they were heros because they noticed the color of someone's skin.

Is this what 9/11 means now? Is this the way America and Americans choose to remember the horrible day when 3000 people died, tragically, at the hands of a few terrorists?

I hope not. Otherwise, not only will the terrorists have won, but the idiots will have won too. The date will be remembered in infamy indeed.

October 05, 2009

What does a cheating senator have to do with a 4.4 million year old upright-walking human named Ardi? Well, not much other than the fact they've both been in the news lately. Which is why I read the National Geographic article about Ardi, and the sex habits that possibly led to this early human's upright posture, immediately before reading the New York Times piece on John Ensign, the cheating Republican senator from Nevada. This seemingly unrelated convergence resulted in a flash of insight: Cheating senators (and their equally duplicitous mistresses) were evolutionarily programmed.

Seems Ardi was not so well-provided for by her tree-living mates with their "clacker-sized testicles":

Let's suppose that some lesser male, with poor little stubby canines, figures out that he can entice a fertile female into mating by bringing her some food. That sometimes happens among living chimpanzees, for instance when a female rewards a male for presenting her with a tasty gift of colobus monkey.

Among Ardipithecus's ancestors, such a strategy could catch on if searching for food required a lot of time and exposure to predators. Males would be far more successful food-providers if they had their hands free to carry home loads of fruits and tubers—which would favor walking on two legs. Females would come to prefer good, steady providers with smaller canines over the big fierce-toothed ones who left as soon as they spot another fertile female. The results, says Lovejoy, are visible in Ardipithecus, which had small canines even in males and walked upright.

Fast forward several millennia later and the New York Times investigative report in which a small, upright walking primate, Senator Ensign, brought loads of fruits and tubers to his mate, Cynthia Hampton, who was also the wife of his staffer, Douglas Hampton. But due to modern campaign finance rules and the US tax code, Ensign was prohibited from gifting his mistress outright. Instead, those fruits and tubers took the form of employment contacts for her husband, and in at least one case, a $96,000 check.

As part of the arrangement, Mr. Ensign also agreed to help line up three or four clients who would pay Mr. Hampton enough to match or surpass his $144,000 Senate salary as an administrative assistant, Mr. Hampton said. His account is corroborated, in part, by e-mail messages Mr. Hampton sent to the senator that spring, and by a work plan that Mr. Slanker and Mr. Hampton prepared.

Soon after, Mr. Ensign called the Hamptons separately. Cynthia Hampton, he said, would have to leave her $48,000 a year campaign job , while her husband would have to quit as planned. But as severance, the senator said he and his wife would give the Hamptons a check for about $100,000, Ms. Hampton said.

Mr. Ensign’s lawyer in June, however, called the $96,000 payment that was ultimately made a tax-free gift from Mr. Ensign’s parents to the Hamptons “out of concern for the well-being of longtime family friends during a difficult time.”

Not bad for fruits and tubers.

It's a pretty sordid story, both the story of Ardi, who was wooed by a hands-free man with small canines, and the story of Mrs. Hampton, who was wooed by an ethics-free senator with a fierce bank balance. But don't feel too sorry for Ardi, or Mrs. Hampton, whose husband ended up blackmailing the senator (he first asked for a "financial settlement" of $6.5 million, then later adjusted that downward to $2 million). Turns out our female ancestors knew how to get the best of both worlds as well:

But there is one other, essential piece to this puzzle that leaves no trace in the fossil record. If the female knew when she was fertile, she could basically cheat the system by taking all the food offered by her milquetoast of a provider, then cuckold him with a dominant male when she was ovulating, scoring the best of both worlds.

Sometimes you have to wonder if evolution did us more harm than good. I mean, those clacker-sized testicles would sure be a sight to behold in modern man.

August 12, 2009

It's a sacrifice, but someone has to do it. And obviously, it's not going to be Sarah Palin.

I start my day with a cup of tea, or three, a bowl of shredded wheat, strawberries and soymilk. This takes time, so I sit at my desk and I read what people who really understand health care reform have to say. They're journalists, economists, and writers who've studied the issue for years, and understand the intricacies of health care policy and the current proposals for reform much better than I do, even though I paid attention in my Economics classes.

Health care reform is a complicated subject. But it's not so difficult that a person with a reasonable grasp of English and a working knowledge of our political system couldn't understand it, especially when it's explained by good writers who refrain from using jargon. And I'm not talking about whoever wrote that email you got the other day, with bold fonts and lots of exclamation points.

For instance, today I read a thoughtful post by Jonathan Cohn, who writes for The New Republic and has been called "one of America's leading experts on health care policy". In it, he explained why the health care reform bill won't put us on the path to rationing health care. On the TNR blog The Treatment, Sharon Eliza Nichols recently wrote about how small businesses may benefit from health care reform, quoting an expert from Georgetown's Health Policy Institute.

See why The Treatment is one of my first stops during my morning tea break?

But for prolific policy debates, you really can't beat Ezra Klein at the Washington Post. I've been following Ezra for a long time—he's a real wunderkind, a twenty-something writer who's passionate as well as informed. (And he's also into food writing.) Not only does he have health care policy down cold, he's also a great interviewer. I particularly liked his interviews this week with Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) and Sen. Johnny Isakson (R. GA). Turns out Isakson was the one who thought up the end-of-life planning language that was inserted into one of the Senate bills, and eventually turned into the "death panel" nonsense.

If you read nothing else but Ezra Klein's columns, you'll be very well informed on the health care reform debate. In fact, on days when I'm limited to one cup of tea, I make sure Ezra's the one I'm reading while I'm sipping.

Another journalist who's made health care policy her schtick is Karen Tumulty, from Time Magazine. Recently she scored a big get, as they say. She interviewed the President of the United States about what he'd like to see in the health care reform bill. But this wasn't my favorite column by Karen. Her column about her brother, who was denied treatment when his kidneys failed, was not only poignant but also a disturbing primer on how individual insurance (the insurance you buy if you're not covered through your employer) fails so many people.

These aren't the only columnists I read; often they point to other articles and charts and debates that are informative, such as the article by Atul Gawande on how one town in Texas manages to charge so much for health care, far outspending other towns in similar circumstances. Yesterday Ezra Klein linked to the NY Times' round table debate (Six experts! All on one page!) on the public plan, which may or may not be included in a final health care bill. And this short article by Uwe Reinhardt, a health economist at Princeton, gives me lots to digest, along with my shredded wheat.

It's because of these writers that I've learned a few basic facts about the American health care system, facts I didn't know before because, frankly, I haven't used it for a while. (It's not just that green tea keeps you healthy; I live in Europe and also am eligible for America's own socialized health care system, the military.)

One startling fact is that more than 26,000 Americans die every year because they lack access to medical care. Another is that a million families declare bankruptcy each year due to medical costs—62% of all bankruptcies. I've learned America spends 16% of GDP on health care, about twice as much as any other country, and if we do nothing, those costs will rise to 37% by 2050.

I've also learned the difference between universal health care (which everyone, regardless of ideology, should be in favor of), single payer health care (which is what Medicare is and what Canada has) and socialized medicine (which is what we have in Britain and essentially how the US military runs its medical care). And although Americans over the age of 65 report very high satisfaction with Medicare, those under 65 don't like it, even though they've never experienced it.

I could go on, but I've finished my third cup of tea. The point is, there's a lot of information out there. Not everyone who writes or emails or blogs about health care policy knows what they're talking about. Neither did I, until I started reading columns by people who've made it their life's work to understand it. I realize not everyone can keep up with the debate to this degree—three cups of tea takes a while to drink, time when I could be attending to my Facebook page, or whipping up a new dish in the kitchen, or researching a book I want to write.

But this is an issue that has a lot of Americans really angry, really frustrated, and really confused. I don't like being angry, frustrated, or confused. So I do something about it.

July 15, 2009

Those of us who were activists and political organizers always said to the health care nay-sayers: When America passes a health care plan (when, not if) it would be a uniquely American plan. Not a British socialized medicine system, not a Canadian single-payer system (unfortunately) and not a French doctors-who-come-to-your-home system (again, unfortunately).

It looks like the House has agreed on a plan, which has yet to be voted on. The Senate will have a similar plan, where the voting and passage are a little more uncertain. Then the two plans, assuming they pass, will go to a conference committee, where differences will be ironed out.

So while we don't know yet exactly what our final American-style health care plan will look like, we have a pretty good idea. Here's how Ezra Klein, a Washington Post writer who's been following the health care debate very, very closely, describes the plan. "On first glance," he says, "it looks good."

It looks good to me, too. Not perfect—our current political system, with a handful of recalcitrant senators, wouldn't allow anything close to a perfect plan. And insurance lobbyists are far too powerful, especially in poor states where insurance companies have near-monopolies. But it looks good. Far better than what we have now, which is a sixth of the American population without any health insurance at all.

My measure is, as always, very personal. Last year my daughter was substitute teaching and had no insurance. In fact, she had the same health care plan many Americans have—the "DGS" plan: Don't Get Sick. Fortunately she didn't get sick, not until two months after her health
insurance from her full time teaching job kicked in, and then she had
to have emergency eye surgery. So I'm acutely aware of how thin the margin is between those who have and those who don't.

Of course, we'd have bankrupted ourselves to ensure our daughter kept her vision (as many Americans do), but with the new plan in the works, it looks like she'd have been able to afford health insurance—the fee is tied to income, with those making 133% of the poverty line paying 1.5% of their income for coverage. More importantly, this low-cost insurance would have actually covered any illness she had. (Many low-cost insurance plans are written in such a way that most costs aren't covered.) Plus, the plan the House proposes will mean she can't be excluded in the future for pre-existing conditions.

Check the link above for more details, and if you'd like to read the actual bill, download it here (pdf). I haven't done that yet; for now I'm outsourcing my thoughts to Ezra Klein, and also to some of the comments there.

I intend to pressure my Representatives and Senators back home to vote in favor. I also intend to send a letter to Sen. Mary Landrieu, who's the Senator from the state where my daughter lives. Her vote will be key, as she's a Blue Dog Democrat.

Let me know what you think of the plan...love it? Hate it? Wish it were more British? More French? Or just more American?

UPDATE: Jonathan Cohn, another health policy wonk, says much the same thing as Ezra, though his main concern is the amount of time it takes to kick in. (Although the pre-existing condition clause kicks in in 2010—excellent news!)

June 11, 2009

The best thing you can do to educate yourself about the tragic and senseless shooting at the Holocaust Museum yesterday is to read this, by Mark Blumenthal, who normally writes about polls, never the personal. But this time it struck home, as he writes about his father-in-law's last visit to the Museum:

We wandered into the museum, through the same doors and into the same foyer where shots rang out this afternoon. My wife had given us visitor passes that she receives as a member of the Museum. The lines were long, and it was not obvious which line we needed to stand in.

Pop was having none of it. He walked away from me and wandered up to the museum staffer standing at the head of the long line leading to the elevators that takes all visitors to the museum exhibits. I thought for a moment that Pop was going to ask directions. I was wrong.

He thrust out his arm in the direction of the staffer, displaying the number the Nazis tattooed on his arm at Auschwitz just a few inches from her face. Without making eye-contact and barely breaking stride, Pop kept walking. Understandably, the staffer barely blinked. She didn't make a move to stop him.

And he reminds us:

The guards and staff at the Holocaust Museum have a special duty. The do more than just protect and operate one of Washington's many heavily trafficked museums. On a daily basis, they help open the doors to the elderly survivors of the atrocities of World War II. As my stories attest, they do it with a remarkable degree of kindness and professionalism.

Thanks to Officer Steven Tyrone Johns for doing his duty, and deepest condolences to his family.

February 18, 2009

Sometimes I think the main reason to have a blog is to have a place to complain when things annoy me. Facebook status updates don't do justice to certain outrageousness, you know what I mean?

While in the U.S. recently I was annoyed by a lot of things, but I don't want to sound like I complain too much, so I'll list the things I like first. Some things I like about the U.S., the South in particular:

1. Yellow squash. Can't get enough of it, and it's impossible to find here. (It figures, my number one item would be food.)

2. Lipton Pyramid Green Tea (Yes, the number two item is also ingestible.)

6. Paper towels in public restrooms (not called toilets, I was
reminded). Except for the new high speed hand dryers at certain train
stations, the whoosh of air we get here just doesn't cut it.

7. Friendliness. It amazes me that folks are willing to talk to strangers without a dog nearby. (In England folks are quite friendly if you're walking a dog.) I had several conversations in the produce section of Wal-Mart.

8. Family. It gets harder and harder to say goodbye to the daughters.

Things I hate about the U.S., the South in particular:

1. TV. I'd forgotten how inane television is in the US, now that West Wing is no longer shown. The "talking head" style of news coverage is particularly stupefying. See:

2. Nancy Grace. God I hate that woman.

3. Physicians who think they're gods. And refuse to divulge their information to mere mortals, i.e. patients. "You sit down and we shine a light in your eyes" is not a proper description of a surgical procedure.

4. Stupidity. Which leads to number 3.

5. Bugs. Giant cockroaches. Little cockroaches. And the need to kill them with strong chemicals.

6. No green grass in the winter. Our grass is green here, despite a week of snow before I left. I love me some green grass.

7. Giant American cars. Couldn't believe some of the monstrosities, still on the road after decades.

8. Poverty. Living in Northern Europe, one forgets there is such abject poverty amidst the wealth of America.

9. Southern accents. "Drops" does not have four syllables. (Okay, that one cracked me up when the nurse said it. Thank god she wasn't paying attention to me.)

10. Fast food. Competing scents from various hamburger joints are overwhelming at certain times of the day.

11. Traffic signals. Busy roads have dozens, at every parking lot entrance, minor intersection, etc. They make driving harrowing, I imagine, for European visitors used to sliding in and out of roundabouts.

12. No public transport. For my daughter, who can't drive until her eye is healed, it's inconceivable that there's no public transportation to her school.

13. No circular walks. People in England know what I'm talking about. Sadly, we went to a lovely lakeside park on a beautiful Sunday and found it deserted. The trail we took ended after two miles, forcing us to retrace our steps. How odd.

14. Preoccupation with missing white girls. See number 2. What is it with wall-to-wall coverage of people's anguish and dysfunctional families?

15. Bad grammar. Just stop it with the double negatives. And especially stop it while talking loudly on your cell phone.

16. Dogs that run loose. I don't mean at public parks, but in neighborhoods. Scared me to death when two dogs came up to me, barking, while I took a walk.

17. Certain food items. Did you know you can buy brains in a can? Somehow, this does not improve number 4.

January 21, 2009

The speech: There's been some criticism, mostly from pundits who read it before they saw it. Frankly, Barack Obama could read the ingredient list on a cereal box and make it sound eloquent and uplifting. His speech was far from a box of Weetabix, however, and I felt uplifted, albeit slightly cold at the image invoked of Washington next to an icy Potomac. The words were inspiring, the delivery even better.

The poem:
Please, no more inaugural poetry. Poetry-on-demand is difficult, and poems read to the masses inevitably fall flat.

The benediction: I hated this line: "we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around -- (laughter) -- when yellow will be mellow -- (laughter) -- when the red man can get ahead, man -- (laughter) -- and when white will embrace what is right." I thought it was divisive, oddly, coming from the not-Rick-Warren preacher.

The dress: At first I was disappointed by the color. The details of the white dress were washed out on television, and the First Lady seemed to have some trouble maneuvering it. But when I saw it up close, it really looked beautiful. And lucky woman, she doesn't need to worry about a tan, or my personal scourge, freckles. Also, I am inspired by both the First and Second Biceps to get my puny arms back to the gym. Toned is in; flab is out.

The other dress: I really liked this one. Yellow is such a happy color, even if it's called maize. With green shoes and gloves, it looked like something I'd wear if my husband were being sworn in (rather inelegantly, by Chief Justice Roberts) to the highest office in the land. The car: Nicknamed The Beast, this behemoth should more accurately be dubbed The Vampire. Did you know it carries litres of the president's blood on board?

The commentary:I had a choice between CNN and Fox, as well as BBC and Sky and who knows what else. I mostly watched CNN, cutting to Fox when they took breaks. (Fox must not be feeling the pinch, because they didn't cut to commercials very frequently.) The Fox commentators were actually pretty good; nary a sour note heard all day, until Glenn Beck came on in the evening. CNN's commentary was sometimes just downright goofy. Watching video replays from MSNBC, I thought they were great. BBC and Sky were funny, with their "mal" coverage, but I always feel like I'm missing something if I don't watch American coverage of US events. Plus the interviewees were second rate; all the cool people were in D.C. getting interviewed by the major networks.